HIGH-PROFILE: THE KEYNOTE LECTURERS AT OTWORLD 2022

The programme committee for OTWorld 2022, under the leadership of the congress presidents Prof Dr Martin Engelhardt and Dipl.-Ing. (FH) Merkur Alimusaj, has designed a diverse training programme based around the core and main topics of the World Congress. The keynote lectures provide exciting insights into the topics of bionics and digitalisation as well as the neurological, psychological and technical aspects of modern orthopaedic treatment and care.

TMR AND OSSEOINTEGRATION

One of the major topics at the World Congress is the connection between Target Muscle Reinnervation (TMR) – a nerve transfer that enables arm amputees to intuitively control their prosthesis – and osseointegration. Prof Dr Oskar C. Aszmann und Dr Agnes Sturma will be jointly presenting the current state of research in this field, showing how this technology is being used by patients in practice. The lecture will specifically focus on high amputations of the upper limb.

OTWorld will for the first time feature joint keynote lecture. Here, interprofessional perspectives will offer revealing insights into the work of an interdisciplinary team. Prof Dr Aszmann will highlight the potential of revolutionary bionic technology and the contrasting clinical reality, explaining how osseointegration can bridge this gap. Physiotherapist Dr Agnes Sturma will be outlining the challenges that must be considered when rehabilitating patients with the help of this treatment after an upper limb amputation.

Prof Dr Oskar C. Aszmann has been conducting intensive research in the field of target muscle reinnervation for 15 years, focussing on all aspects of reconstructive surgery. Aszmann has received several national and international awards for his work.

Dr Agnes Sturma is a graduate of the Bachelor's degree in Physiotherapy and the Master's degree in Health Assisting Engineering. She dedicated her doctoral thesis to the restoration of limb functions and researches in particular in the field of plexus lesions and bionic reconstruction.

DIGITALISATION: OPPORTUNITIES AND RISKS FOR PEOPLE WITH IMPAIRMENTS

The keynote lecture by Prof Dr Bertolt Meyer will identify the new modes of participation that digitalisation can offer for people with disabilities. In addition to current and potential future developments, he outlines new possibilities for the custom design of modern bionic medical aids and explores their psychological benefits. Meyer will, for example, be offering insights into studies proving that modern bionic aids can compensate for stigmas that people with disabilities are confronted with in everyday life. The keynote lecture also addresses the risks of technical progress in bionics and raises ethical issues.

Prof Dr Meyer is a Professor of Work, Organisational and Business Psychology at the Chemnitz University of Technology. His research topics include stereotyping at work, mental health and digitalisation of the economy. He is involved in the Chemnitz German Research Foundation (DFG) "Hybrid Societies" Collaborative Research Centre with a project investigating stereotyping against wearers of bionic prostheses. He personally wears a bionic prosthetic hand, which he independently adapted for his work as a DJ and producer of electronic music to connect directly to a synthesizer.

INTELLIGENT CONTROL AND LEARNING IN PROSTHETICS

In the third keynote, Prof Dr-Ing. Sami Haddadin from the Munich School of Robotics and Machine Intelligence at the Technical University of Munich will be speaking about intelligent control and learning in prosthetics, illuminating the topic from a technical perspective.

Haddadin's research interests include robotics, embodied AI, collective intelligence and human-robot interaction. He has received numerous awards for his scientific work. He is a member of the German National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina, the German Academy of Science and Engineering (acatech) and the EU High-Level Expert Group on Artificial Intelligence. He is also chairman of the Bavarian AI Council.